The relative contribution of climate to changes in lesser prairie‐chicken abundance

Abstract

Managing for species using current weather patterns fails to incorporate the uncertainty associated with future climatic conditions; without incorporating potential changes in climate into conservation strategies, management and conservation efforts may fall short or waste valuable resources. Understanding the effects of climate change on species in the Great Plains of North America is especially important, as this region is projected to experience an increased magnitude of climate change. Of particular ecological and conservation interest is the lesser prairie‐chicken (Tympanuchus pallidicinctus), which was listed as “threatened” under the U.S. Endangered Species Act in May 2014. We used Bayesian hierarchical models to quantify the effects of extreme climatic events (extreme values of the Palmer Drought Severity Index [PDSI]) relative to intermediate (changes in El Niño Southern Oscillation) and long‐term climate variability (changes in the Pacific Decadal Oscillation) on trends in lesser prairie‐chicken abundance from 1981 to 2014. Our results indicate that lesser prairie‐chicken abundance on leks responded to environmental conditions of the year previous by positively responding to wet springs (high PDSI) and negatively to years with hot, dry summers (low PDSI), but had little response to variation in the El Niño Southern Oscillation and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation. Additionally, greater variation in abundance on leks was explained by variation in site relative to broad‐scale climatic indices. Consequently, lesser prairie‐chicken abundance on leks in Kansas is more strongly influenced by extreme drought events during summer than other climatic conditions, which may have negative consequences for the population as drought conditions intensify throughout the Great Plains.

Genetic rescue, the greater prairie chicken and the problem of conservation reliance in the Anthropocene

“…Species so recognized demonstrate seven life-history characteristics [71], five of which (71%) are manifest in GRPC: it occurs in restricted habitats, has specific habitat requirements, low reproductive rates, limited dispersal capabilities and low genetic variability. Empirical evidence for climate-related impacts is provided by the lesser prairie chicken, whose abundances track climatic events that are short term and extreme rather than long term, and with numbers promoted by wet springs but retarded by warmer, drier summers [72]. …”

Demographic consequences of conservation reserve program grasslands for lesser prairie‐chickens

“…Lesser prairie‐chickens require large areas of grassland with specific vegetation structure (Haukos and Zaveleta ). Large grasslands may allow lesser prairie‐chickens to persist among episodic periods of drought and above‐average precipitation that influence population fluctuations (Grisham et al , Haukos and Zavaleta 2016, Ross et al ).…”

Applying dynamic species distribution modelling to lek‐mating species

“…Population indices (varying by year and lek arena) from counts and occurrence in previous seasons were included to address local persistence and dispersal suspected of influencing initial occurrence and occurrence dynamics (Brotons et al, 2012;Sadoti et al, 2013). These indices were local abundance on the lek arena in previous seasons and neighbourhood occurrence (within an estimated 10 km dispersal distance of lek arenas; Pitman et al, 2006).…”

“…We generated climate (30-year average weather) and annual weather covariates (temperature and precipitation deviations from 30-year averages) from gridded 3-km PRISM data (Daly et al, 1997) over three multi-month periods. We expected these covariates to indirectly influence the dynamics of T. pallidicinctus distributions by affecting vegetative cover and food availability, implicated in T. pallidicinctus demographic rates (Giesen, 2000;Grisham et al, 2013;Ross et al, 2016). Summarized methods for calculating these covariates can be found in Table 1.…”